Electronic devices such as mobile telephones, hand held personal computers and personal digital assistants (PDA's) with mobile telephone capabilities have multiple functionalities. Such functionalities include the ability to make and receive telephone calls and send and receive text messages. Such text messages are typically provided by Short Message Service (SMS) applications, Multimedia Message Service (MMS) applications and Enhanced Message Service (EMS) applications.
Using mobile telephones for voice communication and text messaging by an SMS application or otherwise has become very popular. When a user misses an incoming call or text message, or is unable to either immediately attend to an incoming call or read an incoming text message, the user is often reminded by what is know as a missed call reminder alert to at least check (on a display screen of the mobile telephone) for details of either a missed call (unanswered call) or an unread text message. Such a missed call reminder alert is typically an audible signal, such as a beep, emitted by a speaker of the mobile telephones at regular time intervals. The missed call reminder alert will keep repeating at the regular time intervals until the user checks the details of either the missed call (unanswered call) or the unread text message. This repeating of the missed call alert at the regular time intervals for all unanswered calls or unread text messages can be inconvenient, especially when the user is busy or resting (for example when asleep). Furthermore, the missed call alert does not distinguish between calls from different caller identifiers and the continuous repeating of the missed call alert at regular time intervals may cause unnecessary battery power drain.
Skilled artisans will appreciate that elements in the figures are illustrated for simplicity and clarity and have not necessarily been drawn to scale. For example, the dimensions of some of the elements in the figures may be exaggerated relative to other elements to help to improve understanding of embodiments of the present invention.